..續本文上一頁ering for them. The practitioner of Dhamma does not suffer. Well, practitioners such as ordinary monks still suffer, because they haven”t yet fulfilled the path of practice. They haven”t realized amatadhamma, so they still suffer. They are still subject to death.

　　Amatadhamma is the deathless. Born of the womb, can we avoid death

　　 Apart from realizing that there is no real self, there is no way to avoid death. ””I”” don”t die; sankhāras undergo transformation, following their nature.

　　This is hard to see. People can”t think like this. You need to get free of worldliness, like Sumedho did. You need to leave the big, comfortable home and the world of progress. Like the Buddha did. If the Buddha had remained in his royal palace, he wouldn”t have become the Buddha. It was by leaving the palace and going to live in forests that he attained that. The life of pleasure and amusement in the palace was not the way to enlightenment.

　　Who is it that tells you about the astrological predictions

　　AS: A lot of people talk about it, often just like a hobby or a casual interest.

　　AC: If it really is as they say, then what should people do

　　 Are they offering any path to follow

　　 From my point of view, the Buddha taught very clearly. He said that the things we can”t be sure about are many, starting from the time we were born. Astrology may talk about months or years in the future, but the Buddha points to the moment of birth. Predicting the future may make people anxious about what could happen, but the truth is that the uncertainty is always with us, right from birth.

　　People aren”t likely to believe such talk, are they

　　If you (speaking to a layperson who was present) are afraid, then consider this: suppose that you were convicted of a crime that calls for capital punishment, and in seven days you will be executed. What would go through your mind

　　 This is my question for you. If in seven days you will be executed, what will you do

　　 If you think about it and take it a step further, you will realize that all of us right now are sentenced to die, only we don”t know when it will happen. It could be sooner than seven days. Are you aware that you are under this death sentence

　　If you were to violate the law of the land and be sentenced to death, you would certainly be most distressed. Meditation on death is recollecting that death is going to take us and that it could be very soon. But you don”t think about it, so you feel you are living comfortably. If you do think about it, it will cause you to have devotion to the practice of Dhamma. So the Buddha taught us to practice the recollection of death regularly. Those who don”t recollect it live with fear. They don”t know themselves. But if you do recollect and are aware of yourself, it will lead you to want to practise Dhamma seriously and escape from this danger.

　　If you are aware of this death sentence, you will want to find a solution. Generally, people don”t like to hear such talk. Doesn”t that mean they are far from the true Dhamma

　　 The Buddha urged us to recollect death, but people get upset by such talk. That”s the kamma of beings. They do have some knowledge of this fact, but the knowledge isn”t yet clear.

　　Footnotes

　　...1

　　To the Western Sangha newly arrived in England, 1979

　　...””salty 2

　　Not the same connotation as in English. Here it means ”hard” or ”direct”.

　　... Buddhas 3

　　The ””solitary enlightened ones””

　　...4

　　Or: the communists will still let us eat rice, won”t they

　　© 2006 Wat Pah Nanachat

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